The Quick Guide to Website Translation

Megan Robinson is from the San Francisco Bay Area in California. Prior to joining CSOFT as a Project Manager, she worked in market research for the Entertainment Industry where she used her appreciation of cultural differences and translation to decode the behaviors of global markets. Megan studied Anthropology at UCLA and currently serves as CSOFT's Public Relations Manager.

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For businesses that are looking to translate their websites, the process can either be simple, or extremely difficult. When working on a website, whether you’re updating your company’s current page or working on a new site, translation is often the last step of a process that can take a few months or even several years. But in order to ensure a smooth translation and localization process, it is important for businesses to take translation into account from the very beginning of their content creation. We’ve compiled a list of quick tips for companies to consider when working on expanding their reach into global markets:

Craft your words carefully – Keep design in mindWhen working with a multilingual website, the word length can have a huge impact on design, and therefore overall presentation of your company. Content created in English may look drastically different in Chinese or German, so you may need to adjust the layout of your website based on the length of words or phrases.

Consider your keywords – Think global, and localToday, most businesses are aware of the importance of search engine optimization. After putting in the effort to research and find the strongest keywords for your industry, you may be eager to jump to the content creation and then translation stages. However, in order to ensure that your site is truly optimized for international markets, you must research keyword trends in all of your target markets (both native and international). Those keywords that work well in some countries might not find success in other countries.You must also consider the top search engine in each region. Be it Google, Baidu, or Yandex, it’s important to follow the SEO rules for each new market that you enter.

Localize your graphics and images – Represent your brand well around the worldUsing culturally relevant pictures and symbols is extremely important for businesses. At the very least, you should review your website for offensive or culturally inappropriate content. A business who wants to successfully interact with local clients must go beyond asking if their content will offend, and consider how they can relate to and connect with their target audience.Symbols also must be double checked in order to ensure that you are properly interacting with your target audience. When creating content for your website, ensure that your graphics and symbols are files that can be easily edited. This will make it easy to adjust them later during the localization process.

Of course, many of today’s most popular browsers allow you to use the quick ‘translate’ button at the top of a page. But in order to ensure that your content is truly locally relevant, you must go beyond machine translation and begin considering multiple markets from the earliest stages of content creation.

Rather than back-tracking or spending time editing content after finalizing your content for your local audience, consider your global audience. By focusing on your global, or international consumer from the beginning, you will save yourself time (and money) when localizing webpages.

To learn more about partnering with a team of cultural experts and ensuring that your content meets the needs of global, and local audiences, please visit our webpage.

Written by Megan Robinson, PR Manager at CSOFT. Read more of Megan’s blogs.

Megan Robinson is from the San Francisco Bay Area in California. Prior to joining CSOFT as a Project Manager, she worked in market research for the Entertainment Industry where she used her appreciation of cultural differences and translation to decode the behaviors of global markets. Megan studied Anthropology at UCLA and currently serves as CSOFT's Public Relations Manager.